Luo Jiakuan is a gifted and talented painter who comes from Sichuan Province, and he is deeply in love with nature and has his own original creations in lotus and chrysanthemum culture. Those fine and smooth Chinese Paintings of birds and flowers, mountains and rivers are taking us to a quiet lotus pool and heaven, such as the picture of the wild bird by the beautiful lotus, the chrysanthemum flickered in cold wind, the moored boat, the hut by the river and field, cloud and mist around the mountain peak. That deep or light ink interlocks and the light tone are revealing the pure and fresh atmosphere, as if the spring moistening people’s hearts which just comes from Luo Jiakuan’s brush and ink.

　　No matter birds and flowers or mountains and rivers of Luo’s, they are all full of natural charm and delight of life. The artistic language is more abundant when it is put with the quietness of artistic conception and the flow of vital energy. Visual effect embodies his merger tradition skills with western technique. Artistic charm will let viewers experience that plentiful emotion is occupying his soul. Those beautiful natural images often let people enter the reverie state, such as the fabulous lotus, vivid fishes and vast peach garden.

　　Luo Jiakuan has travelled many places in our motherland, for instance many famous mountains and great rivers. There are not merely dense clouds and boundless mountains, but also beautiful scenery of rural area in his picture. With the colored ink, he draws high mountains and great rivers, farmland and cottages freely.

　　No matter painting with the thick or light color, the high and straight mountains could always make people feel natural magnificence and quiet wilderness ecology. He also paints the sail, flowing water and clouds, valley and huts with the technique of painting the birds and flowers, which increases vital energy and makes the picture temperamental and interesting. The ink is thick and pure, which contains the broadness of northern mountains, and without losing the spirit of fresh southern rivers. Over 30 years, he widely studies graphics art with great concentration, experiencing life and learning, meanwhile, trying to not be influenced by traditional skill and technique. Because of the sincere natural styles and poetic feelings in his paintings, they explore out human unique natural aesthetic emotion and spiritual connotation, and build out the pure spiritual home.

　　Jiakuan loves the flowers in nature and has his own understanding to the thousands of different flowers. Among them, his favorites are the lotus in the pool and chrysanthemum in frost, who uses their characters to temper his emotion. The lotus and chrysanthemum in Luo’s works have their own specific artistic conceptions. He is good at catching the inspiration in nature, so that the flowers and birds which he drew are quiet and detached in different poses and colors. If you experience it from the bottom of your heart, you will find it meaningful and as if you participate yourself. The lotus is pure, slim and graceful whereas the chrysanthemum is dreamlike, noble and refined in his works. The scenery merges with the quiet atmosphere perfectly, showing one’s dreamland on paper. Those things in painting come from years of hardship, so that can create a kind of peculiar artistic conception and the poetic ambience on paper, providing the viewer endless enjoyment. Luo Jiakuan believes that, what the painter pursues is not only the quiet and easy atmosphere and making one enjoy the painting, but also to transmit the précis and the depth of humanism.

　　His idea of expression lotus is to use the vivid detail to show the strong natural sense and the delight of life. Some detail as an insect on the lotus, demonstrates painter’s yearning and concern of the natural beauty, and the untiring pursuit to the pure atmosphere. The lotus of Luo’s is not a purely imitation of the traditional skills, but also focuses on the sense of beauty; he regards it as one topic, interlocks the ink and color by different techniques and the style of Han Dynasty. The duck, mandarin duck, aquatic bird and fishes were put into the picture by splash color or splash ink, or by other skills to make one think about the artistic conception and brighten the whole drawing to another stage. It is on the other hand a re-thinking about the concept of locus and its personality given by ancestor. He studies the ancient composition and the western abstract and expressionism, but to express his feeling by his ink and brush. Luo puts the nature in his soul, so that his lotus and chrysanthemum are not themselves, but revealing his emotion as well. Though what he often displays on the picture is one lotus or chrysanthemum, however, it enables viewer to feel the wonderful movement of nature and life which pours painter’s own position and emotion, experiencing the flowers’ moral character with his own life.

　　Luo Jiakuan thinks lotus has abundant emotions, even if the deadly lotus can contrast the brightness of life. So that his lotus is different from others, what the picture displayed is its spirit. In the traditional image, the ones that “the withered lotus loses its umbrella like leaves” and “saving the withered lotus and listen to the rain”, Luo Jiakuan explores its beauty, and let it show the quality “spare no effort in the performance of the duty”.

　　Luo Jiakuan characterizes the ink, it is showed when his uses the ink, color, light and water. It is thick as paint or light one as smoke. We can find that on the technique he paints leaves by use ink. That large lotus leaf is swinging with the wind on the surface of water. The red bud is opening in the mist of the pool. This deep and remote tune became a picture full of have classical taste and modern image, living the sense of quiet and deeply touched. “It is great in the stage of similar and not.” new realm at his skill and technique is being used. So the birds and flowers of him have not merely surmounted the attribute of them, but also push the humane theme to another realm through innovation.

　　Several red lotus and some green spots are swinging in the wind. Some kingfishers all of sudden skims over the water, which give one the harmonious picture of green leaves, red lotus and birds. If you view Luo's work, you can find the spirit of orchid, the fragrance of the chrysanthemum, the charm of lotus and the poesy of the plum.

　　The soul of lotus, the proud of chrysanthemum, the beautiful mountain peak and the murmuring brook all fade in the brush and ink, only when you open your heart can you smell the fragrance of life. It is the world of art that only the works make the viewers feel their heart, will have the deepest artistic charm, the endless sound in a quiet and remote stage, and give one a whole new picture when you watch it again. Perhaps, this is artistic value of the Luo Jiakuan’s works.

　　Tijin

　　Wuwei Hall, in spring, 2008